Applying duhkalayam ashashvatam to social administration

the penultimate chapter of the pastime of Jada Bharat. So, this started with the seventh chapter, roughly. The fifth chapter is Rishabh Dev’s instructions.
Sixth chapter is the departure of Rishabh Dev. And then from there onwards, Bharat Maharaj’s pastime starts. So, this goes on till the next chapter, where in the next chapter, whatever is described metaphorically over here, by Rahugana to Rahugana by Jada Bharat.
So, he, that will be elaborated by Shukadev Goswami to Parikshit Maharaj. So, here what is happening is a multiple level conversation. So, here we have a conversation between Jada Bharat and Maharaj Rahugana.
That is a conversation between Maitreya Rishi and Vidura. That is a conversation between Parikshit Maharaj and Shukadev Goswami. That is a conversation between Shruti Goswami and the sages of Naimisharanya.
And ultimately, that is a conversation between the Vyasadev and us, the readers. And at the deepest level, this is to be a conversation between the Supersoul and the soul in the heart. So, whatever we hear, the soul and Supersoul, they are separated by a big wall of false ego.
So, what the Supersoul speaks cannot be heard by us directly. That’s why the Supersoul manifests externally through various spiritual masters. So that we can hear.
And the more we hear from the external spiritual masters, the more the wall between the soul and the Supersoul starts breaking down. So, the more we hear externally, the more we become capable of hearing internally. The less we hear externally, the less we remain capable of hearing internally.
Why? Because that same Krishna has manifested externally. And when Krishna sees that we want to take guidance, instruction and application in our lives, then he gives us not just externally but also internally. But when Krishna sees that we don’t take the instructions that we’re getting from external sources, then he says, if you don’t want it, then I won’t interfere in your life.
Then Krishna will not give us guidance internally. So, ultimately, when we say the scriptures are meant to be lived, life in the shelter, in the light of the scriptures, how do we do that? The scriptures are ultimately meant to connect us with the Supersoul. When we get connected with the Supersoul, then we live in the light of the scriptures.
So, this particular pastime is among the most radically world-negating pastimes in the Srimad Bhagavatam. World-negating means this world is just a place of misery. Reject it.
Get out of here. So, this probably, this chapter and the next chapter are the most hard-hitting of all the chapters of the Srimad Bhagavatam as far as condemnation of material existence and material life is concerned. Of course, this is a recurrent theme in the Srimad Bhagavatam.
Prahlad Maharaj talks about that material life is like a deep dark well. But emphatically, it is most emphasised throughout in this canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam, first in the fifth chapter, where Rishabh Dev’s teachings are also quite hard-hitting, and again in Jadbharath’s teachings, which are also very hard-hitting. So, what is the end result? Maharaj Jiroguna, generally speaking, the Srimad Bhagavatam is basically centred on a tension between Karmakand and Bhakti.
This whole central, every book has a central tension that is being resolved. For example, in the Bhagavad Gita, the central tension that is being resolved is the conflict between Kula Dharma and Kshatriya Dharma. For Arjuna, the Kula Dharma is that he should protect the members of his dynasty.
The Kshatriya Dharma is that he should never withdraw from battle. So, every book, essentially, for it to be able to engage its readers and carry them forward, needs to have a central tension that is developed and resolved as the book progresses. So, the central tension in the Srimad Bhagavatam is between Karmakand and Shuddha Bhakti.
And we see that right in the start of the first canto, where the Naimishanandi Sayyids are performing the fire sacrifices. And they say our eyes have become black because of these fire sacrifices. We have got no tangible realisation.
Now that you have come, we will hear from you, Siddhartha Swami. So, they were performing Karmakand sacrifices and then they left that for the sake of doing the Shravanam Kirtanam, which is the Bhagavat Vidhi for Bhakti. So, similarly, if we see, you can go over this canto by canto, but we will focus on a few sections over here.
In the fourth canto, there is a pastime of Prachini Parishad. Now, Prachini Parishad is not a godless, sinful materialist. He is a pious, religious materialist.
He is a Karmakandi. So, he has a sort of intense discussion or intense instruction session he receives from Narada Muni. And then the resolution is, give up Karmakanda, practise Shuddha Bhakti.
Here also in the fifth canto, again we will see that Raghobana is not a sinful king. He is a virtuous king. And if we look at the previous sections, his questions are also intelligent.
He says, actually, for a king it is his duty to engage the citizens in their proper prescribed duties. If I don’t do that, then I’ll be sinful and how will the citizens be elevated? So, he’s talking about duty, but from the bodily point of view. Karmakanda doesn’t necessarily free us from the bodily point of view.
Karmakanda is actually the place where religion and the bodily conception intersect. Bodily conception is one circle, religion is another circle. Karmakanda is where religion and bodily conception intersect.
Yes, in the bodily conception, I want material enjoyment. And you get material enjoyment, but get it by religious means. Now, we will rarely find Indra acting as if he thinks I am not the body, I am the soul.
He knows that in the background, but actually he’s interested in the heavenly enjoyment. He’s interested in the apsaras, he’s interested in the wealth. So, the Vedic scriptures ultimately tell us to give up the bodily conception, but not immediately, there’s a gradual progression over there.
So, when Shukadeva Swami is going to narrate to Parikshit Maharaj, at that time, Parikshit Maharaj is not led gradually to give up the bodily conception, because he has only seven days and that time it is a state of emergency. That’s why the narratives that Srimad Bhagavatam focusses on are not Karmakanda narratives, which will gradually free a person from the bodily conception. The Bhagavatam’s narratives are primarily pure devotional service, which rejects the bodily conception completely.
So, this same tension we will see in the sixth canto, in the conflict between Daksha Prajapati and Narada Muni again. Daksha Prajapati is a religious person, and he is so religious that he actually sends his sons to do austerities, although he wants them to come back and become Prajapatis, become producers of the future generations of humanity, but still with austerity, not animalistic sense gratification. But Narada Muni tells him, don’t get into all this, just renounce the world.
So, this is the central conflict in the Srimad Bhagavatam. I just gave examples in three cantos, fourth, fifth, sixth, and of course the first canto, to illustrate this point. So, we need to understand that actually when the Vedic scriptures talk of this world as Dukkhalayam, it is certainly a factual reality.
At the same time, how is that knowledge translated into our living, is very important to understand. So, in today’s class, I will not focus so much directly on the point that this world is Dukkhalayam. We have heard many classes on this topic, and what Srila Prabhupada says in this purport is becoming increasingly evident, that the government taxes people more and more.
In fact, in several countries like America and European Union, normally, logically, it should be that the wealthier should be taxed more and the poorer should be taxed less. But in several countries, actually, the wealthier a person is, the lesser the taxation on that person. Because their logic is that when the wealthy people have a lot of money, and if they have a lot of money, if they are not taxed so much, then there will be more free money available in the economy.
It’s a crazy idea. But the point is, poor people get taxed a lot. So, what Srila Prabhupada says is becoming increasingly true, and for many businessmen, the worst nightmare of their lives is an income tax raid.
An income tax raid. One of my friends is an officer in the income tax office. He said that the business people fear us as much as they fear terrorists.
Of course, even in the income tax department, there is a huge amount of corruption. And then there… So, ultimately, they try to evade taxes, as Prabhupada says here in this purport, that they try to evade taxes in various ways, but the government agents are also very expert. So, then they get caught and they get disappointed.
So, Prabhupada talks about how this is one kind of misery in this world. So, I will not focus on the principle that this world is a place of misery. I’ll focus on how this knowledge of the miserable nature of material existence translates into a practical way of living.
One of the central accusations against Vedic philosophy that is levelled by many Western thinkers and by Western culture in general is that it is extremely pessimistic. You say this world is a place of misery. It’s so pessimistic.
So, and especially in the hippie generation, when Prabhupada went to the West, the post-Second World War generation of America, they became very interested in India. Traditionally, for America, there was only one holy place that was in Israel. Jerusalem, Nazareth, Bethlehem, all those places.
But from the 1950s onwards, because of the persistence in flow of many spiritual teachers from India to the West, India became seen as an alternative holy place, a spiritual place where one’s inner longings can be fulfilled. So, many people came to India in search of God at that time. And they had read some, they had heard something from the spiritual teachers, they had read some spiritual books, the opulist church.
They had been fascinated. This fascination with India started right from the 17th century onwards. And Schopenhauer and all those philosophers, they wrote widely about India.
In fact, Voltaire, who strongly rejected Christianity, was one of the strongest critics of Christianity. He said, everything good in the world has come from the banks of the Ganges. Everything good in the world has come from the banks of the Ganges.
So, there’s a great fascination with India based on the thought systems that India had produced. Of course, most of these people had monistic ideas, because that was the school of thought that was exported from India initially. Before Srila Prabhupada went abroad.
But anyway, there was a lot of fascination. However, when many of these western thinkers came to India, that fascination transformed into vexation and frustration. Because they just couldn’t link the two together.
There were such exalted thought systems that were produced by India, but the living conditions of India were so abominable, were so terrible, that it seemed that even basic human concern was not there. Just beggars lying on thousands in the streets, poor and wounded, with wounds uncovered, and infected and infested with germs and flies, and nobody caring for them. So, the sights of the heartbreaking poverty of India just made these people think, how is it possible that the same civilisation that can produce such lofty levels of thought can also tolerate such filthy levels of living among its own brethren? These Indians, didn’t they feel any sympathy, any compassion, any practical desire to help their fellow human beings? So, this, in fact, many of the people who came seeking for India, they got turned off because of this.
They thought all these thought systems that are there are all impractical. And they went back abroad. Some of them became CEOs of big, big companies, and some of them went back and they became Buddhists.
So, the point here is that at the end of the day, most people don’t just want to understand what your thought systems are. People also want to see what your practical prescription for the world is. What can you offer to the world practically? And we do say that this world is a place of misery.
But it is not that we create misery in this world or we let misery continue to exist in this world. I’ll just give a simple example for this. To illustrate this, that we know when Shukadev Goswami, for the last seven days of Parikshit Maharaj’s life, was continuously speaking Srimad Bhagavatam.
At that time, Parikshit Maharaj and all these sages assembled over there, sat there without hearing, sorry, without eating, without drinking, without sleeping. And we glorify them for their one-pointed attention and hearing. But is that something that can be a standard recommendation for humanity at all times? We see within the Srimad Bhagavatam itself, in the fourth canto, when the citizens come to Prithu Maharaj and tell him, we are all starving because there is no grains and no food on the earth.
They use a very poetic metaphor. They say, this is a forest fire. A forest is burned by leaves.
He says, we are being burned from within by that digestive fire. So what does Prithu Maharaj say over there? Does he say, just neglect your body, absorb yourself in hearing and chanting? Does he say that? He doesn’t. He takes assertive action.
He is even ready to attack and kill the earth even when she has taken the form of a cow. Normally a cow should never be killed. But Maharaj Prithu considers that this earth has derelicted her duty.
The earth is meant to produce food grains for the subsistence of all citizens. And when she is not producing the food grains, she has given up her duty and therefore she deserves to be punished. So he doesn’t tell his citizens, oh, now all of you have got realisation this world is a place of misery.
Now just get rid of the world. What to speak of Prithu Maharaj, even Parikshit Maharaj himself. No, when Kali comes and is trying to kill the cow and attack the bull, at that time he doesn’t say, oh, yeah, now this world is a khalayam.
Now everybody can see this world is a khalayam. So he doesn’t say that. Again, he takes assertive action.
And importantly, in both cases of Prithu Maharaj and Parikshit Maharaj, the Bhagavatam glorifies them for what they do. The Bhagavatam glorifies Prithu Maharaj for his diligence in royal administration and the Bhagavatam glorifies Prithu Maharaj. Why is that? If ultimately this world is to be transcended and we understand this world is a place of misery, then why is the arrangement of the necessities of life in this world glorified? We need to understand that the Vedic culture recognises that this world is temporary.
It is a place of misery. But this world also has to serve as a foundation by which we can take off for the journey to the spiritual world. And for that purpose to be served, for this world to serve as a foundational takeoff for going to the spiritual world, there has to be order in this world.
The same Lord Krishna who declares twice in the Bhagavad Gita that this world is a place of misery. He describes first in 8.15 and he again describes in 9.33 So twice he declares. But that same Lord Krishna also says in 4.7 and 8 that He says I descend in this world and what do I do? I restore order in this world.
So when Krishna says this world is a place of misery, he doesn’t condemn and reject this world. He’s concerned that order be there in this world. So essentially there are two ethos.
Ethos means underlying fabric of thought. There is the Brahminical ethos and there is the Kshatriya ethos. What is the Brahminical ethos? The Brahminical ethos is if somebody insults you, somebody attacks you, somebody torments you, then just tolerate it.
Just tolerate it. And we see this exemplified in Vishwamitra who was earlier a king coming and trying to steal the cow of Vasishta. So at that time what does Vasishta do? He doesn’t do anything.
He says the king is coming and taking and let him take. And then at that time the cow says are you displeased with me? He says no, no, I’m very pleased with you. But as a Brahmana, I’m not supposed to raise weapons.
I’m not supposed to raise weapons. And therefore I can’t do anything. He says no, no, you don’t have to raise weapons.
You just instruct me and I will produce Kshatriyas. He says yes, do it. So Vasishta follows his duty as a Brahmana but he recognises that what Vishwamitra is doing over there, what Kaushika is doing over there is irreligious.
And if somebody else is ready to raise weapons for that, he gives consent for that. He gives consent for that. What is the consent that he gives? Consent is to produce weapons and fight.
So actually it’s a similar situation to a cow being attacked and Parikshit Maharaj is observing Kali doing that. And Vishwamitra or Kaushika is doing that to Vasishta’s cow. So the Brahmanical ethos is just tolerate and translate.
Just tolerate whatever happens in this world. The Kshatriya ethos is take action. And Krishna, when he comes in this world, he comes primarily as a Kshatriya.
And his assertion is take action. So if we see, there is, when Jesus Christ came and preached, what he preached was some kind of Brahmanical ethos. The idea that if somebody slaps you on one side, turn the other cheek.
If somebody plucks out one eye, offer the other eye. However, Christianity did not spread much through Jesus teachings. In the Christian tradition, one of the apostles is Saint Paul.
And Saint Paul acted as a Kshatriya. And he consolidated the Christian community. And it was under him that actually Christianity was a small sub-sect within Judaism.
Jesus never rejected Judaism directly. He wanted to reform Judaism. But the Jews through the conspiracy of the Romans crucified him.
And then Paul basically came up with many ideas that were radically contradicting Christianity. The point I’m making over here is, just a Brahmanical culture cannot transform society. So it was only when Paul came up and assertively started spreading Christianity in an organised way.
He wrote letters. He gave instructions. He travelled around.
His epistles are a very important part of the Bible. Some people say actually Paul distorted Jesus’ teachings. Some people say that he expanded Jesus’ teachings.
Whatever it is. The point is, any school of thought can influence society only when the Brahmanical and the Kshatriya systems come together. If we look at the history of Islam, we will see this tension evident even in the Quran.
When Muhammad was in Mecca, most of the teachings that he gives are Brahmanical. He says there should be no force in religion. He says those who criticise you, neglect them.
But as the people started becoming more and more oppressive against him, his teachings became more and more Kshatriya-like. And then he had to flee from Mecca to Medina. The Quran was revealed primarily at two places.
The Mecca where Muhammad was primarily staying and Medina where he eventually later stayed. So at Medina, most of his teachings are very hardline. So there is that infamous 9.5, the words of the sword, kill the kafirs wherever you see them.
Don’t ask any questions. Don’t talk anything. Just kill them wherever you see them.
So overall, in the Islamic tradition, the Kshatriya ethos totally dominated and subsumed the Brahmanical ethos. And that’s why today Islam has become more of a political search for power in the guise of religion and less a spiritual search for truth in the form of religion. So there are still many sincere Muslims who are trying to approach God.
But predominantly, the Kshatriya ethos has predominated Islam. And then now it has become perverted in the form of terrorism, where Kshatriyas are originally meant to protect the innocent. And the terrorists, they use weapons, but they are targeting the innocent, the innocent and the weaponless.
But the point which we are making over here is that actually, if we study the essential teachings of Christianity, Islam or the Vedic literature, there is this basic point. They also outline to some extent, this world is temporary. This world is a place of misery.
The pleasures of this world are seductions, which will trap us and entangle us. And our real abode is in the other world. That is our shelter.
That is our goal. Kshatriya Prabhupada was asked, how do we know whether a religion is bona fide? He gave basically two characteristics. Do they accept devotion to a personal God? And do they accept that there is an eternal kingdom where is our original home? So essentially, this is a tension that every religious tradition has to resolve.
So in India, if we look at the history of India, before there was aggression on India, starting from the… In 1000 was the first attack on India by Islamic invaders. If we look before that, India was tremendously prosperous. And India was also religious at that time.
So the Kshatriyas who were ruling the world, they knew that this world is a place of misery. But that did not stop them from making proper arrangements in this world for the practise of dharma here. Just like I was talking about how, the idea that don’t bother about food, just absorb yourself in hearing.
That is good in principle, but in practise, that is not a lifelong recommendation. You know, most of us, if we didn’t know that after a Bhagavatam class, there is prasad waiting for us. How much would we be able to concentrate on here? And if it would be a daily uncertainty, it wouldn’t work.
That’s why Srila Prabhupada, he told us that in ISKCON, we want brahmanas with a Kshatriya spirit. We want brahmanas with a Kshatriya spirit. We have to have a brahmanical intellectual understanding.
But at the same time, we have to have the Kshatriya proactivity. The Kshatriya vision to actually arrange and manage and coordinate things in this world. If both are not there, if there is only a brahmanical ethos, then nothing much happens in the world.
You cannot change the world much. So the example of this is Buddhism. You know, the Buddhists have the idea of non-violence.
So we will not use any weapons against anyone. So then what has happened? China attacked Tibet. And they have lost Tibet.
They can’t do anything about it. And in despair, they say that we should not raise weapons against anyone else. But the Buddhist monks are actually doing violence against themselves.
They are doing self-immolation. Buddhist monks in frustration because of the Chinese rule, they burn themselves up. So that’s also a form of violence.
No killing also includes no killing yourself. Isn’t it? So actually speaking, a purely brahmanical ethos is not going to practically bring any transformation in the world. And a purely Kshatriya ethos is going to transform the world, but in a disastrous way.
In a disastrous way. Why? Because if there is no spiritual, philosophical understanding of the next world, then power will corrupt people. And corrupt people are terrible.
So I talked about how Islam has become politicised. But even worse, where the Kshatriya ethos divorced completely of a brahmanical ethos, the example of that is Soviet Union and China. Actually, the number of people who died in the Second World War, seven times more people were killed in the rule of communism in Stalin’s China and Mao Zedong’s, Stalin’s Russia, Stalin’s USSR and Mao Zedong’s China.
And these were their own countrymen who were killed. So why? Because they felt, my way is the only way, anyone who opposes my way, just kill them. So we need a proper balance of a brahmanical ethos and a Kshatriya ethos.
When the two come together, then there will be a transformation that is positive and beneficial for society. So to understand this, I’ll give one simple metaphor. So we understand this world is a place of misery.
So this understanding metaphorically can be extended. So this world is like a hospital. Now, if some patient wants just, okay, I want to build my house in the hospital and I want to have a television and I want to have a movie theatre and I want to enjoy in the hospital.
That’s stupid. But at the same time, if the hospital is to serve its purpose, the hospital has to be organised and managed properly. Only then will the hospital serve its purpose of curing the patients.
The doctors, the machines, the medicines, all of them have to be very carefully managed. Similarly, this world, although it’s a place of misery, so the materialist, they think, okay, we’ll become happy over here itself. We’ll become happy over here itself.
But that is not possible because this world makes us miserable, not just because of janma-mukti-jara-vyadhi but also because of adhi-bhautik, adhi-daivik, adhi-adhyatmik klesh. I wrote an article on karma there in my book Science and Spirituality where I correlated how over the last 50 years and I compared the number of, we cannot really quantify the law of karma but still, we can get a general indication of this. So basically, the karmic reactions come to us as adhyatmik, adhi-bhautik and adhi-daivik kleshas.
So I, in a general way, tried to quantify what was the nature of adhyatmik, adhi-bhautik and adhi-daivik klesha at the start of the 19th century and what was the nature of that at the start of the 20th century. Or rather at the start of the 20th century and at the start of the 21st century, in the last 100 years. So in the last 100 years, we know that abortion was legalised, that illicit sex increased tremendously, slaughterhouses have expanded horrifyingly.
So Prabhupada said, these two are the primary sources of bad karma, abortion and animal slaughter. So if we look at the amount of adhyatmik klesh, the kind of diseases that were there, especially they say, the kind of mental problems that were there at the start of the last century, at the start of this century. It’s huge, much, much more in this century than the previous century.
If you look at adhi-daivik klesh, the natural calamities that are there. I wrote this article when the tsunami had come. So just from 2000 to 2004, the number of natural disasters and the damages caused by the natural disasters was more than any single full decade from 1950 to 2000.
So many more disasters are coming. So that’s adhi-daivik klesh. And adhi-bhautik klesh, we see there are divorces, there are relationship conflicts, there is violence.
It’s far, far more now. In fact, in the last one century, the number of deaths due to violence and murder is more than the number of deaths in the previous 19 centuries combined together. And it’s not just more, it is seven times more than the number of deaths in the previous 19 centuries combined together.
So what it means is, we can see in a general way, not in a specific one-to-one correlational way, but in a general way, that as people do bad karma, the reactions increase in terms of adhyatmik, adhi-bhautik and adhi-daivik kleshes. So now why are people doing bad karma? Now it’s not that people want to be sinful. Actually, people just want to enjoy life.
And in the hope of enjoying life, they often cross moral boundaries and commit sinful activities. And why do people want to enjoy in an unregulated way? Because they think this is the way to live life. They think this is the place of enjoyment and they don’t believe or know about some other world that is a place of enjoyment.
So therefore, the point which I’m making to our context is, if somebody tries to convert a hospital into an enjoyable place, he makes things worse over there. The hospital is not meant to be a 5-star hotel for enjoyment. The whole modern materialistic way of living is to try to convert a hospital into a 5-star hotel.
But if somebody says, okay, the hospital is a place of misery, why bother to take care of anything? Then what will happen? Then the hospital will not serve its purpose. So we see in India, as the Kshatriya rule fell, because of say 800 years of Islamic attacks and then 200 years of British rule, then because the Brahminical culture lost the support of the Kshatriya infrastructure. So infrastructure is that which is used to implement whatever is the vision.
So there is the Brahminical vision, the Brahminical philosophical understanding has to be coupled with Kshatriya infrastructure. That’s why when the Europeans and Americans came to India, they say, oh, you people have produced such great thoughts, but look at your life. So look at the poverty that is there in society.
This poverty is not a product of Vedic culture. It is a product of the weakening and the destruction of Vedic culture. As far as the infrastructure for managing the world is concerned.
So how does all this apply to us as practising devotees? First of all, from a philosophical point of view, we need to be clear that I shouldn’t try to enjoy life in this world. I shouldn’t try to enjoy life in this world because that will simply lead to misery. But at the same time, that doesn’t mean that because this world is a misery, I just don’t care about anything in this world.
No, although this world is a place of misery, this world is also the essential gateway by which people can go back to the spiritual world. And it is my responsibility to make sure that this gateway, this takeoff launching pad functions effectively. So therefore, as devotees who are part of the Krishna conscious movement, whatever resources Krishna has given us, we can’t say that if the food is not cooked properly in prasadam, if the arrangements for the programmes are not made properly, you preacher, you’re going to preach this world dukkha leo.
The mic system is not working. See, now you’re realising it is dukkha leo. No, we can’t do like that.
We have to make arrangements properly. Why? The world is going to produce misery anyway. We don’t have to increase its misery.
Rather, we have to arrange things in a way that people can find a way out of the misery. And when will people see this as a way out of misery? When they see sanctuaries that are centres of serenity and happiness. So the temples have to be places where people are happy.
And if materially everything is disorganised, people cannot be happy. We can’t say people will be materially happy, but materially things have to be basically organised. Bhavanand Prabhu says that when he was there in Mayapur, Prabhupada was so conscientious about everything material.
He said if there would be one tap, which would leak one drop of water every six hours. And he said Prabhupada would come in front of the tap when that one drop would be falling and he would say, you are wasting Krishna’s energy. So Prabhupada did not say, oh, this is dukkha leo, let the water flow on.
So the idea that this world is dukkha leo is not a licence for rejecting this world or acting irresponsibly in this world. This world is dukkha leo, but we have to act responsibly so that we can become purified. We can become disentangled from this world and we can enable others to become purified and disentangled.
And we see Prabhupada himself was very competent and responsible about everything that he did. He wanted the management to be pakka. Of course, Shila Prabhupada, when he personally had to choose between a Brahminical ethos and a Kshatriya ethos, he, after the initial days from 1968-69 onwards, he practically withdrew from the management.
And he focused on preaching and writing. But still he was available for his managers whenever he needed, whenever it was needed. And he did give directions through letters to his managers.
But the point was Shila Prabhupada did want things to work out in an appealing way even materially within the movement. So not that our goal is to make material arrangements, it’s not that we’ll become happy in the material world. But our goal is that the material arrangements will have a basic peaceful substratum by which people can practise spiritual life.
So therefore, even when we hear these sort of descriptions that this world is a place of misery, so that doesn’t mean that we just reject. Say, if a person is a householder, oh, the whole householder order is a place of misery. What should I do there? Does that mean I reject everything? No, that’s not the idea.
The idea is that we don’t have to reject the material world. We have to reject the idea that the material world can make us happy. Having rejected that idea, we also have to recognise the utility of this world.
The utility of the world is that this world can act as a launching pad for helping us return back to the spiritual world. So, I’ll conclude with three quick words to summarise. The materialists glamorise this world.
The impersonalists, the Mayavadis, they demonise this world. Glamorise means, this world, so much happiness is there. Yes, come to Bollywood, come to Hollywood.
There’s so much happiness in this world. They glamorise the world. The impersonalists, the Mayavadis, they demonise the world.
Everything here is filled with misery. Everything here is a trap. Don’t get entangled in this world.
The bhaktas neither glamorise the world nor demonise the world. They utilise the world. So, we don’t glamorise, we don’t demonise, we utilise the world.
But for us to utilise the world, we have to be responsible. And when we utilise the world effectively, then within the devotee community, we can have order at the material level and potency at the spiritual level. We need these two things.
Within the devotee community, we need order at the material level. Things have to be orderly. Prasadam has to be there on time.
The programmes have to be managed properly. Follow-up has to be done properly. If we have big festivals like Yathras and other festivals, there has to be order at the material level.
But you know, there are many, for example, there may be sports events where everything is ordered very nicely. But then there is no potency at the spiritual level over there. So, the potency at the spiritual level will come by the hearing and chanting.
So, in our movement, the morning programme that we have, that creates potency at the spiritual level. And the remaining day, we do practical services. That creates order at the material level.
So, if we emphasise one over the other, if we go too much in the direction of sadhana because I want potency, fine, we will have potency, but nobody will be benefited by that. So, on the other hand, if we go too much in the direction of management and doing practical things in the world, we will do things in the world, but we will ourselves forget the purpose for which we are doing it. So, when we have the proper philosophical understanding and then we blend the Brahminical ethos and the Kshatriya ethos, then we will have potency at the spiritual level, order at the material level.
And then we can come out of this Dukhalayam Shashvatam and return back to the spiritual world, which is Dukhalayam Shashvatam. So, I’ll summarise what I discussed. I went over a broad scope of issues.
So, I focused on the main theme of how does the idea that this world is Dukhalayam translate into action in this world. So, I started by discussing about how western thinkers, western seekers, when they came to India, they were disappointed. You people have such lofty thoughts, but your living is so filthy.
Why is that? Because the Brahminical and Kshatriya ethos had got ruptured in India. The products of the Brahminical thought had remained, but the Kshatriya order had collapsed. Then I discussed the various… So, I discussed from the Bhagavatam itself.
This is Bhagavatam because it is at the moment of death. It is spoken to a person at the moment of death. So, it rejects all Kshatriya ethos, practically speaking.
Just focus on the Brahminical ethos. Glorify somebody who just seven days can hear and chant without bothering about arranging food. That is a prescription for that particular person, Parashar Maharaj.
But then we saw the Kshatriya ethos in Parashar Maharaj attacking Kali and Pruthu Maharaj punishing Mother Earth. So, in a broad way, again the Brahminical ethos and the Kshatriya ethos, the conflict is in Karmakanda and Shuddha Bhakti. I discussed that in 4th, 5th Canto, how that conflict is there.
Then I discussed the various world religions, how Christianity didn’t benefit the world much through Jesus’ teaching, because when Paul came as a Kshatriya, then it benefited the world. In Islam, it had a Kshatriya ethos excessively, because of which it has become more of a political search for power in the garb of religion. We discussed about Buddhism, which has no Kshatriya ethos, practically speaking.
These have no violence, but then they’re doing violence against themselves by self-immolation. So, the Vedic culture offers the balance of the two. And what is that balance? This world has to function as a hospital.
So, the materialists want to glamorise the world and think that this world is a place of happiness. It’s like saying the hospital will be an enjoyable place, which is wrong. And I discussed how the more we seek enjoyment in the world, the more there are Adhibhautik, Adhidaivik, Adhyatik glaciers.
But, on the other hand, if the hospital is to treat and cure people, it has to be organised properly. So, we don’t glamorise or demonise the world, we utilise the world. And utilising means, we have to responsibly function in the world so that there is order at the material level and there is potency at the spiritual level.
Thank you very much. Are there any questions? Yes, please. Is it true that in Satyuga, because the process was meditation, so people could access only Paramatma but not Bhagawan? It is not necessary that meditation can lead only to Paramatma.
It depends on what is the process that meditation is a part of. If we see the Smaranam that is there as a limb of Bhakti, when that Smaranam becomes intensified, Bhaktivinoda Thapura explains that this Smaranam is analogous to Dhyana, is analogous to Dhyana of the yogis. And Sri Prabhupada also explains in the Srisri Parpod that even the yogis when they are doing Dhyana, at that time when they realise the Paramatma, depending on their conception and motivation, they have two alternatives.
That they think I am the Paramatma, then they will merge in Paramatma and attain Brahman. They think I am the servant of Paramatma, then they will attain Bhagawan and go back to the spiritual world, usually in some kind of Shanta Rasa trees or something like that. But in general, for example, in the Prema Pradeep, which is a novel written by Bhaktivinoda Thapura, he describes many yogis who are Vaishnavas.
So they use Yoga as a Sadhana. They practise Yogasana as a Sadhana to assist in their Bhakti. So when it is said in Satyuga, Kriteyadhyayato Vishnu, so the very verse is not referring to the Paramatma conception.
It is referring to a personal conception of God in Vaikuntha. It is not saying Kriteyadhyayato Paramatma. It is Kriteyadhyayato Vishnu.
So that Yogadharma is Bhakti. But that Bhakti is using Yogasadhana to attain the Supreme Lord. So that’s why what will be attained by that, if a person is practising Bhakti, is not Paramatma, it will be Bhagawan.
Did I answer your question? Yes, sir. Any other questions? Yes, please. You keep saying, you know, the Vedic books are sort of saying that God is God and how people don’t realise that.
So is it true that there are also a few people who are following in this path of life? Because I don’t think they are really God or not. But they are very sophisticated, you know, the way they approach it, the way they are telling us, and they are also sharing a lot of thought. So what kind of guidance do you have, because without guidance, the difference of what we are utilising, What is last? They are what? They are minimising our differences of their intelligence.
Okay. They are minimising our also what is happening in our life. They are trying to bridge to us, and actually what we are doing.
Yes. So in general, some Muslims, you will see some Muslims, they practise sincerely, they will be receptive to us also. But at the same time, they are also involved in killing cows.
So, in general, if we look at Srila Prabhupada’s statements about Islam, overall they are quite positive. Although Srila Prabhupada does talk in the CC Purports about how there are many Muslim kings who destroyed the temples in Vrindavan and all that, but if we look at his overall tenor, it’s quite positive. Srila Prabhupada says that all the Muslims, basically Prabhupada appreciates the cultural aspects of sincere following of the religious principles.
For example, he says the Muslims learn the verses of the Quran, like that Hindus should learn the Bhagavad Gita verses. The Muslims, whenever they get some money, they build a mosque. So like that Hindus, they have so much money, they should build temples.
So in general, he appreciates the cultural aspects and Srila Prabhupada is certainly aware that there are these elements within Islam which are violently against Vedic culture. But in general, like Chanakya Pandit says, see the good in everything. So we see over there that they are following some elements of devotional culture.
So we can appreciate that and there are a small number of Muslims, especially many of the Sufis, they are also vegetarians. So, certainly that is a major flaw, killing of cows and if one actually studies the Quran carefully, there are at least very clear recommendations that one should prefer a vegetarian diet where it is possible. But that has been obfuscated presently.
So that is a, like Srila Prabhupada would even criticise Christians that thou shall not kill, you are neglecting that. Now actually thou shall not kill is not a statement from the Bible, it is a commandment given by Moses. So the Bible is generally said to be the holy book of the Christians, the holy book of the Jews is the Torah and the holy book of the Jews applies even to the Muslims because they also accept Moses as a prophet, Muslims accept Moses and Jesus as a prophet but they say Mohammed is the last prophet and he is the best of all prophets, that is their idea.
So thou shall not kill applies even to the Muslims actually, it is not just to Christians because it is a part of the Ten Commandments, it is a universal dictum for all the religions that come from the Abrahamic tradition. So anyway, we focus on seeing whatever is good in others and encouraging that, encouraging that. Answer the question? Yeah.
Any other questions? Thank you very much.